Hunter Dickenson Opens Up on Transfer
Hunter Dickerson opens up on his transfer to Kansas.
Comes off as an honest guy. Michigan Basketball doesn't look great though, as far as seriousness of the program, imo.
*Dickinson
My spell check kept switching to Dickensian, so fighting that battle still left me with a fail. 🫤
How did you misspell his last name twice (in two different ways) but then correctly post a clickable link? The world is a crazy place.
I'm dumb, but an IT pro. 🤷🏾♂️
fair response
+1
I had to look up "Dickensian" because my dumb mind is mostly in the gutter.
Hold up a second OP. How in the hell is the following a poor reflection on Michigan because this is ALL he says about us:
ON WHY HE LEFT MICHIGAN:
“I knew that I had an opportunity to try to test the NBA waters, I knew I could go back to Michigan, or the NCAA has the transfer portal that’s been a hot topic nowadays. I just felt like I needed something new. I felt like three years at Michigan, I did some great things, made some memories there, but I just felt like I wasn’t yet ready for the draft and I wanted to do one more year, try to win a national championship and try to develop a little bit more. That’s when I decided to enter the transfer portal and just try to explore new opportunities with that.”
Outrageous!
:-)
Please keep reading. He suggests that expectations were lower, conditioning wasn't as stressed, and that preparation wasn't taken as seriously.
“They’re definitely a little bit harder than I expected. Obviously, coming into college you know the workouts are going to be hard, because it’s a high-Division I program. I’d say they were definitely harder than Michigan, especially at this point. I mean, at Michigan, we didn’t even get to campus until like July 1, so we had way more of a head start here. I remember the first couple of practices I was so out of shape, and I felt like coming in I was in pretty solid shape, but I needed a lot more growth in that area.”
The "especially at this point" may be doing a lot of work in that sentence. Apparently, KU players return to campus sooner for summer workouts.
Is that a handicap for Michigan? If returning July 1 is what we've always done under Sanderson, probably not.
(Also: I've never heard a guy say, "Yeah, these workouts are easy." They know not to tempt fate.)
ya, because if there's one thing michigan's hoops s&c program is known for, it's the country-club atmosphere. i mean that's why they call it "camp sanderson' - because it's like summer camp! and nobody has ever come to ann arbor and gotten noticeably bigger and stronger.
#firesanderson
i don't know, man - i liked hunter as a player here. i think he got some unwarranted criticism, put it that way. but this just strikes me as some measure of also-unwarranted sour grapes.
Given the situation last season, I can understand why he's gotten his head into a bad position regarding Michigan. Creating a team out of groups of players in such widely variant situations didn't work out well. You have to try and develop talents like Bufkin and Jett Howard, even though the payoff might never happen. At the same time, you have a dominant college all-star who isn't being surrounded with solid, experienced players who give the team a chance to win the championship.
I see Hunter's tenure here as an example of exactly why this period in college basketball is difficult to enjoy. In the past, he would have been a star here, even without an NBA future. Ten years from now, maybe there's a new structure for college football and basketball and players have contracts and coaches can plan ahead. Then you add the COVID mess, which is trickling down to screw up the kids coming into college, taking away scholarships and playing and development time.
TLDR: I don't blame him a bit for being a bit salty. This transition phase for college athletics has been particularly unkind to him.
How has it been unkind to him? Really odd take.
Dickinson gets to play five years of college basketball thanks to Covid, he’s getting paid legally during it, and he got to transfer with immediate eligibility. In what way has this been unfair?
Maybe Dickinson and Cade can do a podcast. First episode guest: Erick All
Ant Wright can host.
He's playing 3D chess....
Busting the balls of his old teammates as workouts will now be harder at UM with this narrative getting out :)
Anyone who’s spent any time in Ann Arbor the last 3 years knows that Hunter was a fixture at the bars / party scene, especially Skeeps. His lack of conditioning is on him, not Michigan
You do know that a 22 year old can train during the hours of 6 am to 6 pm, and then go out and party at night. Then get up and do it again. It's kind of what most D-1 athletes do.
And look how well that did for Hunter’s conditioning while he was here. Did he seem to you that he got any faster or stronger during his 3 years here (while most other players noticeably did)? Skeeps 3 nights a week during the season isn’t a great idea.
to be fair, how many 7 footers do you see play 33 min a game. almost zero. he did.
Most successful D1 athletes definitely do not do that. Unserious ones who never make it to the next level do. During the time I was VERY active in the AA bar/party scene as a student and the couple years after, I didn’t regularly see players like Jabrill, Devin Bush, Rashan, Caris LeVert, Jourdan Lewis, GRIII, Stauskas, etc. When you did see them, it was either celebrating a big win or in the middle of the off-season. I did regularly see guys like Wilton Speight, Shane Morris and Mitch McGary during the season though.
Nephew is a student at KU. Said he met Hunter at a bar in Lawrence this summer. Some things don't change?
It may be that he's saying that Kansas has significantly better S & C program. That said, it's also common for transfers to sing the praises of their new landing spot.
You missed the part about the difficulty of practices and higher expectations with conditioning…
Based on the results from players coming out of Camp Sanderson the past decade, I’m going to go out on a limb and say the “higher expectations with conditioning” is a load of BS
This is just the lowest, most meaningless hanging fruit of any new player or coach in a program. "Oh, now we work out harder / eat right / bench press Buicks." Has anyone ever gone to a place and said, "Well, *now* I can relax and take it easy!"?
The only thing that perhaps surpasses it in worthless player/coach speak is that a new defensive coordinator is going to be "more aggressive."
It's interesting that he has a full grasp of Kansas's offseason program, considering it's July 10th. Maybe go through the whole thing before making comparisons.
Joe Milton kinda did at Tennessee. Kinda is a key word here, because Milton's point was that Michigan thought they had an ugly duckling that they couldn't recognize as a beautiful swan, and the result was they asked Milton to do things he isn't built to do, which led to a whole lot of unpleasantness.
To your larger point though, yeah, these quotes are basically Crash Davis's second day of interview lessons for Nuke LaLoosh.
He says the practices are harder, and you don't have to read between the lines when he talks about the great coaching and team chemistry with his new club.
Is this true? I never really thought about it.
"Kansas landed the most prized player in the transfer portal era of college basketball when former Michigan star Hunter Dickinson committed to the Jayhawks earlier this offseason."
I don’t know the exact figures, but I’d assume it’s pretty rare for a consensus All-American, two-time 1st Team All-B1G (or conference of similar status) to go along with a 2nd Team All-B1G to be in the portal.
If Hunter isn’t the most prized, he’s certainly up there among the most prized. I can’t think of any more decorated players that have entered the portal, that’s for sure.
Most prized based on accomplishments to date? Sure. Most prized based on potential? Maybe not,
Those were some of the most generic/benign comments I've ever read. Practice tempo is faster? They get to campus earlier?
Not sure i'd consider that as evidence "Michigan Basketball doesn't look great though, as far as seriousness of the program"
Dead to me.
How comments about the draft factor are pretty disingenuous and self serving. His draft prospects are hindered by his slow footedness laterally and will not be helped at all by winning a national championship.
Spot on. He's delusional thinking a national title will instantly have NBA scouts thinking he's a good draft prospect. It sucks for him that the NBA has transitioned away from bigs with limited mobility and Bill Self isn't going to make him a better athlete. At best, he will be a fringe NBA player or wind up in Europe.
Sounds like Hunter just can't process the situation yet, especially after the success he personally had at Michigan.
Is he good at bowling?
He is put into a position to either burn bridges or own up to his desire to grab the biggest pile of cash available in the near term. Of course, he obfuscates his response. What's left, in terms of his response, seems neither genuine or compelling. He'll have his money to console him, nor is he the first person to be in the position of looking for PR cover with no camouflage in sight.
Can it also be true that he does have a better chance to win at Kansas next year than at Michigan? While he clearly avoids the topic of money, the chance to be at a better program and win a NC is probably a serious draw as well. Can two things be true at the same time in our current reality? Some say no.
Would it be a knock on him if he did just leave for more money? I know fans hate that when it doesn't break their way, but people leave for higher paying jobs all the time and are usually praised for taking advantage of their opportunity.
Yeah, but old people love to get mad when young people get lots of money. These tend to be the same people who yell "free markets" a lot but they don't let the hypocrisy slow them down. Only arthritis and hip replacements can do that.
Ageism at its finest. As an old man with 2 hip replacements I think this comment tars with a broad brush.
My post means no disrespect to Hunter. Despite being old (user name checks out) and with at least one bad knee, I applaud Hunter's effort to get the most out of his college experience, namely:
- a degree,
- mo' money, and
- a much better chance to win championships.
I love how he played for us and wish him the best for his future prospects.
Didn't see much hate towards Michigan other than the conditioning/camp bit. That being said, does he come off as a little cocky? When he says, essentially, that he thinks winning an NC is the best thing to help his draft stock? I know nothing about basketball, but doesn't he have plenty to work on as opposed to winning a title?
that is a funny comment indeed. i think i read somewhere that only two 1st round picks in the 2023 draft played in a final 4.
does he come off as a little cocky?
Being cocky is his whole thing, so probably. That said, playing a significant role on a FF/Championship team certainly won't HURT his draft stock.
Could of just stated that he's working harder now at Kansas than he did at Michigan, and be done with it.
He was a huge loss (no pun intended) but I feel this year's team will get up and down the court faster without him. Will that translate to better basketball? We will see.
Defensively, we needed more out him.
So, addition by subtraction? People on here were saying the same thing about Jett and his defensive liabilities. We'll have to see how things work out, but I hope we see an improvement on the defensive end with whomever replaces those 2 players.
I'm in the addition by subtraction camp as it relates to HD.
Yes, he was a great postup offensive player, but he was a bad defender, offered no rim protection, bad passer (despite what every tv commentator said), didn't rebound at the level he should have, bogged down the offense and, IMO, didn't seem to be that great of a teammate.
Jett was a freshman and played like it. Would have been a much better sophomore.
I tried saying he wasn't worth what Kansas is paying to keep him here and got trashed for it.
Seems to continue to be true.
Well there's no salary cap or anything, so he's worth whatever you've got to give to him.